Populism by the people: An analysis of online comments in Portugal and Spain∗

Abstract

There exists a gap in research on populism which tends to focus on politicians rather than on the people. This research addresses that by assessing the prevalence of populism and analyses citizens' populist discourse in online comments in Portugal and Spain. The methodological approach is based on quantitative content analysis and co-occurrence textual analysis. The main findings point to a similar salience of anti-elitism in both countries, despite the different levels of electoral success of populist parties. These findings suggest that more attention should be paid to the views of citizens in populism research.